


Karma

by dgalerab



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Confessions, Let Akaashi rest 2k16, M/M, Pining, Yoga
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-20
Updated: 2016-09-20
Packaged: 2018-08-16 07:53:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8094019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dgalerab/pseuds/dgalerab
Summary: Akaashi pulls a muscle and Bokuto offers to help him with yoga. Akaashi knows a bad idea when he sees it, and he really only agrees because he's suddenly acquired a deeply rooted desire to see Bokuto do yoga.
For multiple reasons.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this as a Tumblr headcanon but then I started writing it, and then it became something entirely different. But also not really. 
> 
> Also, IT'S BOKUTO'S BIRTHDAY! I hope he's happy today. :)

Quite frankly, the pain in his shoulder isn’t that bad, and had he known what was to follow, he probably wouldn’t have even bothered with the whole ordeal.

That’s probably a lie.

His neck pinches every time he moves wrong, and Bokuto doesn’t notice at first. Bokuto isn’t stupid, Akaashi thinks (or possibly hopes), but his ability to fail to notice the most obvious of gestures is incredible. If he were anyone else, Akaashi would be fairly annoyed with him. They’re friends, after all, good friends, and Bokuto _could_ notice that he keeps grimacing as he moves.

But it is Bokuto, and there’s no malice in his ignorance, and to some extent Akaashi has just settled into a permanent state of fondly annoyed with Bokuto. He’s not upset that Bokuto hasn’t noticed, even when it’s two days later and his tosses are suffering for it.

That’s definitely a lie.

He’s upset with Bokuto, just a little, and Bokuto notices that. He blinks at him, lips curving into a pout. “Are you upset with me?” he asks. “You’re tossing different.”

Ah, so he has noticed _that_.

“I pulled a muscle in my shoulder, that’s all,” Akaashi says. “It’s not too bad.”

Bokuto gasps like he’s just been informed that Akaashi is dying. “Akaashi!” he says, though it comes out more like _AgHgaaashiii_ as it plummets into the distance, to the godless wasteland where Akaashi redirects all the other mispronounced, overdramatic versions of his name. “That’s not good for you! You should give it rest.”

“It’s fine, Bokuto-san, I’ll put some ice on it at home,” he murmurs with a sigh. Perhaps it was better that Bokuto didn’t notice. This is tiresome already.

Bokuto nearly lifts him off his feet as he drags him along to sit down by the side of the gym. “Let me massage it,” he says. “It’ll help, and then you should put something warm on it to loosen it up and…”

_Oh gods no,_ Akaashi thinks, at the same moment that some other treacherous voice in the back of his head says _Oh hell yes._ “Bokuto-san,” he starts, the sensible voice winning all the way up until Bokuto sticks his hands right up Akaashi’s shirt, rucking it up and placing his hands on Akaashi’s shoulders.

“Hm?” Bokuto says, eyes wide and innocent as he bends Akaashi over a little and though Bokuto’s gaze might be innocent, Akaashi’s thoughts are _not at all_ innocent right now.

“Nothing,” he whispers, yielding to the horrible voice in the back of his head as Bokuto’s thick, hot fingers dig into his shoulders. It hurts, at first, Bokuto’s fingers curling like talons, but then he zeros in on the knot in the crook of Akaashi’s neck.

Akaashi’s neck is really sensitive, and even more so now that it’s Bokuto’s fingertips skidding against the soft skin there. Akaashi’s head tilts, unbidden, and he has to clamp a hand over his mouth just in case he moans a little. He looks back, quickly, and Bokuto has his brows furrowed and his tongue poking out through his lips, eyes focused on his shoulder, and _dammitdammitdammit_ Akaashi really likes this idiot.

Apparently, though, Bokuto’s hands are magic (a thousand and one dirty jokes flit through his mind, all of them inexplicably in Kuroo’s voice) and the ache in his shoulder lets up. The ache somewhere a lot deeper in his heart gets worse.

( _Hey, massage my heart,_ the Kuroo voice says. It is… exactly something that Kuroo would say and so Akaashi allows himself to imagine Kenma kicking him for it.)

“You should do yoga with us!” Bokuto blurts.

Akaashi blinks at him. “Pardon?” he says.

“My mom and I do yoga,” Bokuto explains, eyes open and earnest. “It’s great for my shoulders, you should try it.”

Akaashi is generally pretty good at visualizing. He cannot visualize Bokuto doing a sport that is primarily focused on relaxation. He can, at most, imagine Bokuto bending into some kind of position that is definitely more provocative than a yoga pose, at which point his brain derails and warns him that he is approaching the kinds of visuals he saves for late at night, alone, and not right in front of his crush.

“Okay,” he says, because Akaashi is, at heart, a data miner, and if Bokuto does yoga he has to know what that’s like. Also, it might be good for him. That reason seems profoundly secondary at the moment.

Bokuto’s face lights up like it’s Christmas. “Really?!” He bounces up with massive leap, and for one, unreasonable moment Akaashi is worried he’ll just keep rising and blow through the ceiling. He almost starts laughing at the image that gives him. Bokuto is making Akaashi unreasonable more and more often and it is irksome.

“Yes, Bokuto-san,” he says.

“Awesome! How about tomorrow you come over and you can have dinner with us and then we’ll have to rest for a little because yoga’s not great with a full stomach but after that we’ll do yoga or maybe we’ll do it before dinner and…”

Akaashi already regrets this.

-X-

Akaashi is exhausted already by just stepping into the Bokuto household.

There are bright colors everywhere. _Everywhere_. There’s a rainbow rug in a corner, rounded out by a bright blue wall and a bright green wall. There are owl trinkets all over the place. At least twenty owls look at him from the entrance hall alone. There are shoes discarded all over the place. There are so many of them. At least one person is screaming in the distance.

Bokuto kicks off his shoes into the pile and Akaashi at least makes an effort to slip them off gently next to the pile. “Okaaaaaaaaaaaaasaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!” Bokuto cries, dragging Akaashi into a hideously orange kitchen, decked to the roof with owl prints and owl plates.

An older woman turns and looks at them, a ladle in her hand, one child hanging from her shoulders and another from her leg. A third one dashes around her in circles. All of them look like small versions of Bokuto. Akaashi both loves them instantly and wants to tape their mouths shut preemptively.

“Yes, Koutarou?” she says brightly, and Akaashi can’t help but think that if his mother was faced with three, clingy, loud children while she was cooking, she would have promptly kicked everyone out of the house and locked the doors.

Bokuto grabs Akaashi by the shoulders and displays him like he’s a stray dog that Bokuto found. “This is Akaashi!”

“Ah, the famously spectacular Akaashi Keiji,” Bokuto’s mother says. She looks him up and down and manages to put her hands on her hips, two child ornaments and a ladle unmoved. “Though to be honest, from what Koutarou tells me, I still can’t tell whether you’re a wonderful person or an asshole.”

Before Akaashi can manage to be shocked at a mother saying _asshole_ in front of three children, the running child dive-bombs him with a strangled shriek of _Agkkghhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaashiiiiiiiiiii_ and knocks all the air out of him. “Quite frankly, Bokuto-san,” he wheezes, “I’m not sure either.”

She guffaws loudly, and Bokuto laughs with her, not bothering to help at all when a second child detaches itself from its mother and uses the lack of balance the first produced to leaps into his neck, sending him sprawling. “Akaashi and I are doing yoga!”

“Ah, and then he’s staying for dinner! Your brothers are coming over too, so I’ve cooked plenty.”

“Yes, Okasan!” Bokuto cries, extracting Akaashi from his suffering. Something wild in Akaashi refuses to let go of the tiny Bokuto in pigtails that has wrapped herself around his neck, but the part of him that has not entirely _lost its mind_ is eager to follow Bokuto as he drags him along to a place hopefully free of mini-Bokutos.

Bokuto pulls him into a room off the side of the hall and amazingly it’s free of owls, colors, and noise. It’s just a quiet, white room with tatami flooring, some large windows, and one bookshelf off to the side, a seat in one corner.

“This is the quiet room,” Bokuto says, quietly. It is the most surreal experience of Akaashi’s life. “So you gotta make as little noise as possible in here. That’s the rule.” He smiles. “But you’re a quiet person anyway, so you’ll be ok.” He sits down, cross-legged. “Sorry I let you get attacked like that.”

Akaashi sits in front of him, feeling weirdly off balance already. “It’s alright. Your siblings are…” _Horrifying. Loud. Adorable. Like you, and I love them dearly already._ “…sweet. How many of them are there?”

“Six,” Bokuto says.

Akaashi kind of wants to throw himself out of the window beside him and run, kind of wants to hug all of them.

“Three younger sisters and three older brothers. And two of my brothers have kids already so there’s a lot of us.”

“Good gods,” Akaashi murmurs. It puts Bokuto into perspective. He probably has to be loud just to be noticed in all that chaos. His utter collapses have always seemed an uncontrollable impulse, but now Akaashi wonders how much is simply Bokuto’s nature and how much is learned from Bokuto needing to be upset enough to be heard over the ruckus to receive any comfort.

“But they’re all really nice,” Bokuto says, seeming worried.

“Yes,” Akaashi says, gently. “I’m eager to meet your brothers.”

Bokuto grins. “They’ve heard a lot about you,” he says, and he’s still focusing on keeping his voice soft and it makes everything seem so intimate that Akaashi’s head spins.

“Bokuto-san,” Akaashi breathes, before he does something stupid and tumbles head first into this feeling. “Yoga?”

“Mm?” Bokuto says. “Oh. Yeah.” He flops back onto his back. “So we usually start by just laying down and relaxing.”

“Ah,” Akaashi says, laying back as well. He feels like he’s crossed into an alternate universe where Bokuto is not a hurricane stuffed into a very attractive body with painfully innocent eyes. For some reason, he can’t bring himself to relax.

“Akaashi, stop picking at your fingers,” Bokuto says.

Akaashi forces his fingers open and lays them flat on the mat, letting out a deep breath.

“I’ll just do it and you can follow, and then I’ll help you, ok?” Bokuto says. “And that way it’ll be quiet, too.”

“Of course, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi says.

He’s fairly good with new movements. He follows Bokuto for a while, trying not to get distracted when Bokuto rolls onto his stomach and pushes himself up, his thick arms straining as he tilts his head up and takes a deep, content breath. “So this cobra pose,” he says. He cracks open one eye and peers down at Akaashi, then pulls out of his pose to get right into Akaashi’s face.

Akaashi stops breathing. Their noses almost touch. Bokuto gently guides his elbows until he’s straight ( _haha,_ says the Kuroo voice) and presses his lower back downwards so his spine curves. “Is that still comfortable?” Bokuto asks.

Akaashi nods, because he can’t exactly tell Bokuto that his hand is searing straight through into Akaashi’s soul as it rests only a few, horrifying inches above his ass.

“You gotta keep breathing,” Bokuto says, and Akaashi realizes he’s been holding his breath long enough that he might just pass out.

Akaashi manages to reign in his suddenly mutinous brain for another ten minutes, at most, before Bokuto pushes himself into downward dog and Akaashi is given a spectacular view of both his back and his ass and nearly faceplants as he tries to replicate it and admire Bokuto’s body at once.

“Do you want help? It’s a bit of harder one,” Bokuto says.

_Do not do that to yourself_ , Akaashi thinks, but somehow what makes it out of his mouth is, “Yes.”

Bokuto bounds over and his hands are on Akaashi’s hips as he lifts them into place, standing somewhere in between Akaashi’s legs. ( _Haha, he’s between your legs,_ the Kuroo voice says.) “That feel alright?” Bokuto asks.

“Wonderful, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi croaks.

This is hell. This is truly hell. Akaashi has been abandoned by the gods and his own mind alike.

At this point, Akaashi can’t tell if he’s intentionally messing up poses or if he’s just fried his brain and can’t even process the things that Bokuto is doing beyond the fact that a lot of them make his ass look very, very nice, but he does know that Bokuto is pressed up right behind him and is lifting his arms as Akaashi tries very, very hard not get an erection.

“You’re not bad, but you’re really tense,” Bokuto says quietly.

Akaashi nearly cackles. _I’m a nice person. I don’t deserve this._

_Are you, though_ , his own brain replies. _Are you really._

Maybe Akaashi should start laughing at a few of Bokuto’s jokes. Some of them are actually quite funny. Or maybe he could just smile at Bokuto more often. Or praise him a little. Surely not even the boundless excitement Bokuto is capable of could be worse than being bent over while Bokuto helps him stretch his arms back (child’s pose is Akaashi’s worst enemy.)

“Fuck me,” Akaashi whispers under his breath.

“Hm?” Bokuto says.

“I said help me,” Akaashi says. “I’m not sure my legs are in the right position.”

“Oh,” Bokuto says, and suddenly he’s up against Akaashi, one arm around his waist and the other lifting his leg.

At this point Akaashi’s thought process has boiled down past _I’m really gay_ and is just sitting at _gay._ Repeatedly, because any other thought will probably end badly.

By the time they finish, Akaashi wants the floor to swallow him up and eat him alive.

“So, did you like it, Akaashi?” Bokuto says.

“It was alright,” Akaashi replies, eyes focused on the ceiling.

“Are we gonna do it again?”

“If you’d like, Bokuto-san.”

“Okay,” Bokuto says, with a bright smile. “Let’s go see if there’s dinner yet, huh?”

Akaashi nods, fishing his phone out of his bag on their way out.

**_I’m going to be a nicer person from now on_** **,** he texts Kenma.

**_Why_** , Kenma texts back.

**_I’ve seen hell._ **

**_Does this have anything to do with how bokuto keeps texting kuro_ **

**_No._ **

**_Pls just tell him how you feel_ **

**_NO._ **

Akaashi frowns and shoves his phone back into his pocket. He can’t help but wonder what Bokuto might be texting Kuroo. Really, if Kuroo was so rude as to project his voice into Akaashi’s head at his lowest moments, the least he could do is show Akaashi those texts.

Somehow, that seems like the sort of logic that Bokuto might use and Akaashi feels insane just having considered it.

“Anyway, you can shower in my bathroom,” Bokuto says.

Akaashi blinks at him. “Your bathroom?”

Bokuto nods vehemently. “Yeah, I get the big bedroom ‘cause I’m the oldest living here, so I’ve got my own bathroom. Come on, I’ll show you!” he says, dragging Akaashi upstairs.

The room has a little sign saying “Koutarou!” with a tiny horned owl sketched on the side. When Bokuto opens up the room, Akaashi at first thinks that it doesn’t fit him at all, but as he looks at it, he realizes it’s actually… very Bokuto.

There’s pictures all over the place, some of them printed pictures of owls, others paintings of owls, a few selfies with Kuroo, one that Akaashi barely remembers taking with Bokuto, a few pictures of the team, probably taken in secret with Bokuto’s phone camera. There’s an old middle school jersey hanging from one wall. His bed is huge, and it’s not… made, per se, but all the blankets are folded where they’re tossed onto the pillows. The sheets are gaudy and filled with owls.

Everything is kind of chaotic, with the pictures and the laundry basket teetering on top of the very tall dresser and a box of books in the corner, but at the same time it’s neat, and everything seems to be in the place that Bokuto designated for it, even if that place doesn’t make a lot of sense.

There’s a small door off to the side, which opens into a small bathroom, just a standing shower and a sink and toilet. “You can use my soap and shampoo,” Bokuto says, looking a little nervous about having Akaashi in his room, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet.

Akaashi looks up from where he’d absentmindedly picked up the selfie with the two of them in it, lovingly placed on the nightstand. “Mm?” he says. “Oh. Yes. Thank you, Bokuto-san.”

“Have fun!” Bokuto chirps, and darts out of the room, door banging after him.

Akaashi shuffles through his bag to grab his clean clothes, and he sighs when he realizes Bokuto forgot to give him a towel. He sighs and starts looking through the dresser. There is no organization to the drawers, and so each drawer has a few boxers, and Akaashi feels like he’s rifling through Bokuto’s underwear drawer like a creep.

One of the drawers has a stack of letters. Akaashi’s curiosity overcomes him (he is becoming too curious about everything Bokuto does and it is, once again, irksome). He pulls out the stack. They are obviously confession letters, given the odd pink hue of the envelopes, and now, no matter how wrong it seems, Akaashi needs to open one of them.

He slides out the letter carefully, and opens it. He blinks. This is Bokuto’s handwriting, made obvious by the fact that every other kanji is just a little off.

_You’re really pretty and you’re cool so go out with me?_

It’s the worst confession letter ever, and yet Akaashi is mindlessly envious of whoever it’s meant for. He shoves it back in and pulls out the next one. ( _Are you trying to be a nicer person by spying on your friend?_ the Kuroo voice says. _My, my, Akaashi, isn’t this why you suffer?_ Akaashi kind of hates Kuroo right now, even though he knows it’s not Kuroo hassling him.)

_Ok I’m really bad at this, I don’t know what to put into a confession letter but I think about you owl the time. No wait that’s a pick up line you can’t put those in a letter. Can you put them in a letter? You’re so smart I’d ask you what to put into a letter if it wasn’t your letter._ _Go out with me._

Akaashi stands there, frozen, looking over the letter a few times. Outside, it behinds to rain, and it feels like it’s started to rain inside Akaashi as well.

He doesn’t have the heart to open the next several. These are… drafts. Confession letter drafts, nearly ten of them, to someone that Bokuto likes so much he wants to ask them out perfectly, in a letter, even though Bokuto hates sitting down and writing. Someone pretty, and smart, and cool, and not Akaashi.

He slips them back into the drawer and keeps looking for that towel. In the end, he finds something fluffy and bright and utterly unlike his heavy heart at the moment. He considers crying right up until he gets into the show and realizes that he is currently _naked_ in _Bokuto’s room_ and then he simply lets his head knock against the shower wall, cursing his teenage libido and teenage feelings and teenage… yoga… problems.

He changes into his clean clothes and pads down the stairs to find a wet Bokuto bounding around a… an older Bokuto. Two older Bokutos, one of them holding a two year old Bokuto. The real Bokuto (or perhaps Akaashi’s Bokuto? Akaashi murders that nomenclature in his head without remorse) squawks in delight when he sees Akaashi, and before Akaashi can move he’s got Bokuto’s massive arms around his head, dragging him onto display. “This is Akaashi!”

Bokuto’s brothers laugh at once, in frighteningly the same way that Bokuto does, and start attempting to mimic the way that Bokuto says his name in shockingly even more horrifying cries. Akaashi will never be able to hear his own name the same way again.

Bokuto yelps and pulls him close, covering his ears in such a way that he instead manages to cover Akaashi’s windpipe, against all odds. “Shut up! I know how to say his name, it’s just hard to say it right when I’m so excited because he’s a really exciting person!”

“Nii-chan, you’re killing him.”

“He’s turning blue.”

Bokuto shrieks with panic and bounces back, letting Akaashi breathe. Akaashi wonders if he will survive this dinner.

“That’s it!” Bokuto’s mother cries. “Out of the kitchen! Go on, out!”

She tosses two girls out of the kitchen by their necks, then points at Akaashi. “You. Can you cook?”

Akaashi nods, somehow terrified.

“Good. Come help me.” She stomps out and grabs Akaashi by the neck as well and jerks him into the kitchen. She releases him and fixes him with a look.

Akaashi realizes that because she has Bokuto’s eyes, he had assumed they held the same innocence as his. They do not. “You’re staying the night,” she says.

“Um…” Akaashi says. Not many things get him off balance, not even Bokuto, but this woman does.

“It’s raining and you’ll catch a cold if you walk home in this. Should I call your parents?”

“N-no,” Akaashi manages. “They’re away.”

She snorts. “I thought you were awfully unconcerned about how long you stay. No one waiting back home, huh? No wonder you’re so stiff.”

“I am not…” Akaashi chokes out, but that’s as far as he gets. He _is_ stiff and it could very well be that it’s because he doesn’t get much affection from his parents, but there’s no need to throw it in his face like this.

“Taste,” she says, shoving a spoon into his face.

He opens his mouth automatically and tastes whatever she gives him. It’s pretty good soup, it seems. “It needs more salt,” he says.

“Yes, I suppose it does,” she says, her eyes apparently working on how to flay his soul alive.

“Bokuto-san,” he says.

“Won’t it get confusing to call me and my son the same thing? You’re so terribly formal,” she says.

“I’m certain I can keep the two of you straight,” Akaashi says. He has reasons for sticking to the formalities with Bokuto, though they’re familiar enough to drop the honorific. None which he would like to share with Bokuto’s mother.

“Wouldn’t it be easier to call him Koutarou?” she prod, and Akaashi stiffens.

“I would rather not.” At this point, this feels like he is in a sparring match with this woman who has stacked all of her white hair on the very top of her head, is a head shorter than him, and is wearing a flowery apron and an owl broach.

“Ah, would that be too intimate?” she says, narrowing her eyes. “You’re not very good with affectionate gestures, are you?”

“It’s not in my nature, no,” Akaashi grits out. “But it is also not appropriate for the nature of my relationship with Koutarou-san. Bokuto-san.”

She cackles. “Goodness, Keiji-dear,” she says. “You seem to have very strong thoughts about your relationship with my Koutarou. Coincidentally, so do I!” She winks at him, and Akaashi has no idea what she means, but he suspects it is not good. She looks like she would like to bury him in the back yard.

Could she have inferred his feelings from Bokuto’s stories? Akaashi tries not to panic. Surely not.

Now that he’s entirely on edge, though, she smiles and it’s as kind as Bokuto’s smiles. “But no matter. The salt is on the top shelf there, could you get it for me?”

-X-

Actually, Bokuto’s mother’s cooking is _very_ good. The distribution system seems to be first come, first serve, and if two people come at the food at the same time, there is a winner takes all, no violence barred fight for it. However, Akaashi finds that all of Bokuto’s siblings, nieces and nephews are as distractible as he is, and it’s easy enough to snag food while no one is looking at it.

He helps himself to third round as Bokuto fights with his brothers for a second.

They are all very loud, and Akaashi does his best to tune it out. Occasionally they will bump the table and it will slide over a few inches, and Akaashi quietly rights it and keeps eating.

This dinner, too, puts Bokuto into perspective. His sisters are all quite a bit younger than him, and he acts like the perfect older brother, listening to their stories, appreciating their talents. At the same time, he has three older brothers, and it is obvious that for the first few years of his life, Bokuto was the little brother, both cherished and constantly picked on.

His siblings are all simple types, very much like Bokuto, though it seems they don’t have quite the penchant for mood swings as Bokuto. As they prod at him, Bokuto has little ups and downs, and his brothers seem to respond accordingly. They withdraw every so often to tease the second youngest brother instead, or pat his shoulders encouragingly.

His sisters mostly tease each other, all being in the age where adults teasing them would be too cruel, but none of them ever falters at the words of the other.

It seems, then, that this is a Bokuto thing. Or rather, a Koutarou thing.

Akaashi does not want to think of Bokuto as Koutarou while Bokuto’s mother is looking.

His mother is a menace. She comes off as simple and carefree as the rest of them, but she is calculated beyond measure, and Akaashi can only tell in the moments she doesn’t seem to think anyone is looking. Really, he can only tell by her eyes, and it is only Bokuto who has his mother’s eyes.

Perhaps Bokuto is different from his siblings because he has his mother’s intelligence.

“And Nanami-dear?” she asks, fixing Bokuto’s oldest brother with that sharp gaze. “She never comes with you to visit.”

“Maybe our wives would come more often if you didn’t attack them every time they came,” the second oldest says.

“I don’t attack them,” she gasps, sounding amused and looking horrified. “I merely size them up. I want the best for my dearest children after all.” Her eyes flash at Akaashi. “Keiji-dear, you didn’t feel _threatened_ , did you?”

Akaashi stares her down, back stiff. So she has noticed Akaashi’s feelings. Still, he didn’t expect her to mention anything in front of Bokuto. _What is she playing at, pretending he’s on the same level as Bokuto’s sisters-in-law?_

“Not at all,” he growls.

Bokuto blinks at him, then blanches. “Okasan!” he cries. “It’s not like that!”

“Like what?” she says innocently. “I only meant that hear about him as often as I hear of Nanami-dear, so he’s got to be up to the same standards.”

Bokuto buries his face in his hands, bright red. Akaashi wants to wither and die, but more intensely he’d like to spite Bokuto’s mother. Bokuto’s brothers are dissolving into laughter beside him.

It occurs to Akaashi that he’s agreed to do this more than one time. He has never made such a mistake before.

-X-

“Anyway here’s some clothes for you to sleep in. We can sleep in the same bed, ‘cause it’s so big.” Bokuto hands him the clothes, still looking bashful.

“Will your mother be alright with that?” Akaashi asks.

“Oh,” Bokuto says, shuffling awkwardly. “Yeah. Sorry about her, she’s pretty overprotective, you know? Ever since dad died. She’s driven away like… probably ninety of my brothers’ girlfriends.” He starts, waving his hands desperately. “Not that you’re my girlfriend!”

_I wish I was,_ Akaashi thinks. “I suppose it means your brothers’ wives are very strong willed.”

“She’s extra protective of me, that’s why she’s being weird with you, you know,” Bokuto says. “I don’t handle bad things as well as my brothers. Or my sisters.” He looks down, shoulders slumping. “Or anybody.”

Akaashi stares at him. “That’s not true,” he says softly.

“Don’t worry about it, Akaashi,” Bokuto mutters. “I know I tell you to back me up a lot, but I actually like that you’re honest with me.”

“I am being honest,” Akaashi says. “You’re fairly reliable. Your slumps never last long and they’re manageable.”

Bokuto looks up at him slowly, hopeful. “Really?”

“Would I give you praise you didn’t deserve?” Akaashi whispers.

Bokuto laughs. “I don’t think you even give me the praise I _do_ deserve.”

Akaashi smiles despite himself. “Maybe not,” he says.

Bokuto gapes at him, eyes wide. “You admitted it,” he breathes.

“I’m trying to be a nicer person,” Akaashi murmurs. The rain is steady outside, and the lamps are soft inside, and Bokuto is so close that Akaashi can feel the warmth radiating off of him. His heart is in his throat.

“I like the kind of nice you already are, though,” Bokuto says back, and Akaashi has to turn away before he falls forward to kiss him. “You know, like… nice… in a mean way.”

“I think I should get changed, Bokuto-san,” he says quietly.

Bokuto watches him get up and do his best not to run to the bathroom. He changes quickly and splashes cold water in his face, taking deep breaths. There is no point in confessing his feelings now, and it frightens him to think how close he’d come. He has never understood what it is about Bokuto that makes his mind go blank like this.

He huffs a sigh and goes back out to face Bokuto. Bokuto eyes him, which means he is doing a bad job of collecting himself. Bokuto never notices these things. “You ok, ‘Kaashi?”

“Yes, Bokuto-san. I think you just wore me out,” he says, and smiles a little. That might have been a mistake. Akaashi is not one to smile just because. Bokuto will notice he is lying.

“Oh… okay,” Bokuto says, a little unsure. “So hey, which side of the bed do you want? I like to sleep next the window but it’s ok if you want that side…”

“You can have it,” Akaashi says, laying down on the other side and staring at the ceiling. There are glow in the dark sea creatures stuck up there.

“I bet you’re wondering why I get such a huge bed and my own bathroom.”

“I wasn’t,” Akaashi says tiredly, knowing he’ll be ignored.

“It used to be my parents’ room, but I think when my dad died my mom couldn’t take the big bed alone,” he blurts. Akaashi freezes. He doesn’t know what to say to that. “So she switched with my brother because he was the oldest one of us still living here, but he moved out and my other brother moved out and now it’s mine.”

Akaashi is silent.

“That’s why she’s so weird about it, you know,” Bokuto continues, gently.

Akaashi says nothing.

“When we bring home someone who makes us happy.”

Akaashi traces a glow in the dark snake with his eyes, back and forth, back and forth.

“I think she’s scared we’ll end up lonely too.”

Akaashi’s words have frozen deep inside his chest.

“Hey, ‘Kaashi?”

“Will you ever say my name correctly?”

Bokuto is quiet at that for a while, but then he says, “Do you think it’s ok to ask someone how it’s best to confess to them?”

“It would take the romance out of it,” Akaashi says. “Confessions are supposed to be genuine. Heartfelt.”

“Oh,” Bokuto says. “Ok.” Akaashi hears him lay down. “Thanks, Akaashi.”

“You’re welcome, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi says, and somehow, he does not cry, not even in the dark, at most half a meter from Bokuto, who he would so like to curl around and hold close, and who is currently thinking of how to confess his feelings for someone else. He finds himself hugging one of Bokuto’s pillows to his chest instead, reveling in the fact that it smells of Bokuto and that Bokuto is snoring softly beside him.

-X-

He wakes to find Bokuto wrapped around him, one arm tight around his waist. After a moment of regretting every decision that could have possibly led to this moment, he tries to wrestle Bokuto’s arm away. It will not budge.

Fortunately, his phone is within reach, so he grabs it and texts Kenma.

**_I am definitely going to try to be a nicer person._ **

Surprisingly, even though it’s three in the morning, he gets a text back quickly.

**_You could start by not texting people in the middle of the night when they’ve got a light sleeper for a boyfriend, thank you and goodnight._ **

Akaashi blinks at his phone for a long time. _Boyfriend?_ _Kenma?_ Akaashi stares blankly at the wall before it occurs to him that whoever texted him is in possession of Kenma’s phone. At night. Which means they’re sleeping together. Kenma is sleeping with another man, who he is dating.

He tries to shake Bokuto awake again, but all that achieves is that Bokuto snorts a little and curls in onto Akaashi a little more, his breath and hair soft against Akaashi’s neck.

Thunder rolls through the house slowly.

_Ah_ , Akaashi thinks. Ever since he was a child, he slept fitfully through storms. Bokuto must have noticed somehow and pulled him close as a comfort. Akaashi sighs. “It would be like you to comfort me and then fail to notice when I want you to stop, Bokuto-san.”

Bokuto gives a small hum in response, nuzzling his head against Akaashi’s cheek. Akaashi sighs. At least, until the morning, he can enjoy this. Bokuto will most certainly wake before him, and Akaashi won’t have to watch as he pulls away, unaware that he is taking bits of Akaashi’s heart with him.

He closes his eyes and dozes off again, slipping one of his hands over Bokuto’s. In the morning, he’ll wake alone, but until then, Bokuto’s fingers slide right under his own, thicker and shorter than his own.

-X-

He wakes to a heart attack.

He’s sprawled out in his sleep, his limbs no longer pulled in by Bokuto, since, as he predicted, Bokuto released him when he woke. He does not, however, wake alone. He wakes with Bokuto’s face right above his own, and he nearly starts up right into Bokuto’s nose.

“Have you been watching me sleep?” Akaashi says, his voice still laden with sleep and horror.

“Yeah,” Bokuto says, blinking innocently.

“Why?!”

“Well, it’s Saturday,” Bokuto says, as though that explains it.

Akaashi stares at him.

“I didn’t want to wake you up,” he continues. “So I figured I’d wait here with you.”

Akaashi groans, rubbing at his eyes. “That wasn’t necessary. How long have you been there?”

“Um… maybe two hours,” Bokuto says, poking his tongue in between his teeth as he hops over Akaashi to sit on the side of the bed, swinging his legs happily. “But that’s ok, it was nice.”

“If you’re capable of sitting still for two hours, why don’t you do your homework?” Akaashi mutters.

“I like you more than I like my homework,” Bokuto says simply, then grins, unaware of how Akaashi’s heart flutters.

“Well, good morning, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi says, pushing himself up and looking up at the ceiling. “Did you know Kenma has a boyfriend?”

“Besides Kuroo?” Bokuto yelps.

Akaashi blinks. “Ah. It’s Kuroo-san, then.”

Bokuto blinks at him slowly. “Well yeah,” he says, as though it’s common knowledge. “He’s been with Kuroo for like… forever. You didn’t notice?”

Akaashi frowns. He thinks over their interactions, how Kenma and Kuroo look at each other. “I suppose I did,” he murmurs. “I just thought… well. It hadn’t occurred to me that anyone I knew could be gay.”

“Oh,” Bokuto says. “Because you’re… straight?” He says it cautiously, like he’s trying to gauge Akaashi’s reaction.

“Because I’m gay,” Akaashi says, before he can regret it. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before we slept together.”

Bokuto goes red from head to toe. “I didn’t grope you anywhere, I swear!” he cries. “I just got up to go to the bathroom and you were making these little sounds and I thought it might help to give you a hug, and then you kept whining whenever I let go so I just stayed and…”

“It’s alright, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi chokes out, grabbing last night’s clothes from the nightstand, trying not to look at the picture of them, cheeks smashed together as Bokuto happily takes the picture before Akaashi can protest. Will that picture someday be replaced by a picture of Bokuto’s girlfriend? Wife? “You didn’t raise false hopes or anything. No harm done.”

Bokuto frowns. “Wait, what?” he starts, but Akaashi shuts the bedroom door behind himself, opting to find a downstairs bathroom to change and cry in.

To his horror, he finds himself tearing up before he can actually find a bathroom and instead runs into Bokuto’s mother. She cocks her head at him, just like Bokuto would, and Akaashi is very much aware that this is not the place to have this breakdown. He should go home, where he would be alone and free to wallow in his misery until Monday.

“Why are you crying?” Bokuto’s mother asks, seeming genuinely concerned.

“I believe that you made it clear last night that you’re perfectly aware why I’m crying,” Akaashi grits out.

She blinks at him, and _hell_ she does that the same way Bokuto does too. “Ah,” she says, softly. “We may have misunderstood each other.”

“Ah,” Akaashi says bitterly. “So you didn’t mean to frighten me away from your son because I’m in love with him, even though we’re both men?”

“No,” she says, putting her hands on her hips. “I most certainly did not. You’re quite formal, you know. Your parents are the traditional type, are they not?”

Akaashi nods, clenching his teeth so hard it hurts.

“Then you must have heard quite a bit of chatter. How disgraceful it is, to be with another man, etcetera, etcetera.”

He drops his head, unable to meet her eyes. “Yes,” he murmurs.

“There will be no such talk in this household. If you ever need to take a break from that mindset, you come over, do you hear?” she says firmly. Akaashi looks up at her at long last, bewildered. “My son used to cry himself to sleep until he started talking about you. I only wanted to be certain that you won’t leave him behind when he gets too bothersome for you. That’s all. Your feelings and what the two of you do with them is between you and Koutarou.”

“Yes, Bokuto-san,” he whispers.

She claps him on the back. “But until you sort it out, the bathroom is at the end of the hall, feel free to cry it out.”

Akaashi is not sure what to make of the entire situation, but he feels like he has been bested by an old woman who reaches up to his chest.

-X-

“Akaashi,” Bokuto says, and he says it correctly, carefully, and he’s been watching Akaashi like a hawk lately. Akaashi’s skin is crawling with nerves. Bokuto’s stare is an infinite one, when he uses it. “Are you coming over today?”

Akaashi has been over at Bokuto’s for yoga precisely six times until now. Each time has been more hellish than the last, and the most recent of sessions ended with Bokuto’s mother poking her head in at the exact same moment that Bokuto had Akaashi on his hands and one foot, pushing the other up as he knelt right behind his ass.

Bokuto might not have realized how it looked, but Bokuto’s mother knew both how it looked and that Akaashi knew as well. Possibly the only reason she hadn’t pointed it out to Bokuto was because she saw the look of mortification on Akaashi’s face and took pity on him.

Assuming that each of these sessions would be worse than the last, he is terrified to see what might happen this time.

_Make an excuse,_ Akaashi’s mind supplies. “Of course, Bokuto-san, I said I would, didn’t I?” his mouth supplies.

Bokuto grins. “Okay. I thought of a bunch of new positions we could try and…”

Konoha nearly keels over laughing and Akaashi wonders how he could murder him without drawing Bokuto’s attention to it. “Is that so, Bokuto-san,” he says.

“Oh, and Kuroo’s coming over, because it’s Kenma’s birthday soon and Okasan is going to show him how to make her pie…”

Akaashi shoves his locker closed a little too hard. “How lovely,” he hisses. Even Konoha shuts up at the look he’s giving the locker door. Bokuto does not notice.

This is unfair. Akaashi has smiled at Bokuto five times this week and even laughed at one of his unfunny jokes. He also has not teased Kenma for dating the biggest nerd any of them has ever met, even though he can just imagine what Kenma’s face would look like if Akaashi managed to ask how his relationship was through chemistry pun. Akaashi has a few drafts saved.

Akaashi has been a nice person lately and still he suffers. ( _Maybe if it’s suffering to you, you should stop doing it_ , says a voice in his head that sounds strangely like Kenma.)

“Yeah! Both of my favorite people are gonna be there! Hey, you think Kuroo will do yoga with us? He’s pretty flexible, I’m sure he’d be good at it.”

( _You know, I think he’d really rather do “yoga” with Kenma…_ the Kuroo voice in the back of Akaashi’s head says.)

“We’ll ask him, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi says.

“Okay!” Bokuto replies cheerily, dashing out of the locker room, Akaashi dragging himself out after him.

-X-

 

“You know, Tetsurou-kun,” Bokuto’s mother coos while Bokuto runs to the bathroom, leaving Akaashi alone in the lion’s den. “I have caught them in some very compromising positions while they’re doing this _yoga_.”

“That was one time, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi growls.

“I don’t suppose _yoga_ is one of those young person code words nowadays?” she continues brightly.

“Ah, not that I know,” Kuroo drawls, leaning his elbows on the table and grinning. They have both rounded on Akaashi like hyenas. “But I doubt it. I know for a fact that these two are not involved in any… _extracurricular activities_ with each other.”

Akaashi glares at him and he hopes Kuroo can feel the painful amount of hate behind it. **_I hate your boyfriend_ , **he texts Kenma under the table

**_Please just tell bokuto how you feel and then kuro will stop being annoying too_** , Kenma texts back. Even Kenma is against him.

**_That’s not happening._ **

“Perhaps you and Kenma-dear could give them a talking to about proper communication.”

Kuroo laughs. “Ah, well, we’ve had a long time to practice, I admit,” he says. “But it was quite the endeavor for us to get together…” He rubs his neck awkwardly. “It’s only because Kenma is a heartless monster that we managed it at all.”

Bokuto’s mother laughs loudly.

“Well, that sounds like quite the story. Keiji-dear, perhaps you could learn something from Kenma-dear,” she says, hinting quite forcefully at _something_.

“How to cease feeling all emotion when it grows cumbersome?” Akaashi tries.

Bokuto darts back into the kitchen. “Anyway!” he cries. “What are you guys talking about?”

“I believe we were planning my funeral,” Akaashi says miserably, while Bokuto’s mother and Kuroo grin.

Bokuto gasps and claps his hand over Akaashi’s ears, quite badly. “Are you guys being mean to Akaashi?” he cries.

“I can still hear you, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi says.

“Would we ever be mean to Akaashi,” Kuroo says innocently.

“We’re trying to be helpful,” his mother says.

Akaashi wishes looks could kill because his would right now.

“You guys are just jealous I like him the most,” Bokuto cries.

“You don’t like me more than your mother,” Akaashi says, sighing. It would be easier, maybe, if Bokuto didn’t say things like that.

“Yeah I do, ‘cause when I figure out how to give you the most awesome genuine confession ever you’ll be my boyfriend and that’s the most importantest,” Bokuto says. It takes him a moment to realize that everyone is staring at him, and another to realize why. “Wait, no!” he cries, shoving Akaashi out of the kitchen.

“So do you think now they’re going to… _do yoga_?”

“Well, all my other sons have lost their virginity in that room, so…” She gasps suddenly, whacking him over the head with the pie pan. “It’s not _healthy_ to go straight from confessions to sex! Where is your sense of romance?”

“Ow! I didn’t say that’s what I did!”

“Shame on you, Tetsurou-kun!”

“I’m still a virgin, _stop hitting me_!”

-X-

Akaashi’s brain is still glitching by the time Bokuto gets him up to his room and sits him, a little too forcefully, on the bed. “Okay, so… uh…” Bokuto says, wringing his hands. “I should not have said that in front of my mother. Or at all. Hold on, just… pretend I said nothing and I swear I’ll try again and it’ll be _awesome_ and…”

“Bokuto-san,” Akaashi chokes out. “Back up a little, you’re getting carried away. You’ve been planning on confessing… to me?”

Bokuto goes boneless and sits on the floor, shoulders slumping. “Well yeah,” he says. “But I swear I was gonna do it a lot better!”

Akaashi slips off the bed with a thud, which is one of the least graceful things he’s done in recent memory, awful yoga sessions included. His shin ends up pressed to Bokuto’s. “I thought you were confessing to a girl,” he admits.

“You knew I was gonna confess?” Bokuto squawks.

Akaashi blushes. “I found your letters,” he mutters.

Bokuto throws his hands over his face. “No! Those are really, really bad!”

“I only read two,” Akaashi says gently.

Bokuto glances at him through a crack in his fingers. “Oh,” he says. “I guess that’s not so bad.”

“They were sweet,” Akaashi says, and he knows now that he’ll regret his next sentence, but hell, he’s already neck deep into all this, might as well leap head first. “They made me pretty jealous.”

“Really?” Bokuto blurts, pulling his hands away. He looks like Akaashi has gifted him a unicorn instead of just admitting something mildly like a compliment. “Of whoever you thought I was going to give them to?”

Akaashi can feel the heat creeping up his neck. “Yes,” he whispers.

“Because they were so great?” Bokuto grins, bravado grating along Akaashi’s nerves.

“They were terrible, actually,” Akaashi says. “But they were so… you.”

Bokuto’s shoulders slump. “Are you saying I’m terrible?”

“I’m saying I liked them,” Akaashi says. No, that’s not exactly what he’d like to say. “I like you.”

Bokuto cocks his head. “Really?”

“Really,” Akaashi says.

Bokuto grins. “Me too!”

“I gathered,” Akaashi laughs.

“Can I kiss you?”

Akaashi leans forward and answers the question wordlessly. Bokuto is hesitant at first, but then he moves, and Akaashi can tell that this is not his first time. He slots one knee between Akaashi’s thighs so that he can lean over him, one hand hot at the back of his neck, the other strong at the bottom of Akaashi’s back.

If doing yoga has taught him anything, it’s that Bokuto is strong enough to manhandle Akaashi into just about any position he pleases. Currently, that position is pushed up against Bokuto’s bed, back curved, legs spread and his neck tilted back so that Bokuto can lean over him as he kisses Akaashi’s lips furiously.

He brings up his hand just a little to tug on Akaashi’s hair, almost gently, but his thumb sweeps across Akaashi’s neck and Akaashi lets out a little sound that Bokuto promptly swallows up, using the moment of hesitation to slip his tongue into Akaashi’s mouth, licking across the roof of his mouth in a way that shouldn’t be pleasurable, logically, but which undeniably is.

He shudders, which only makes Bokuto’s hands tighten along his spine, pressing him closer and forcing his head further back so that Akaashi can only struggle to hold onto Bokuto, fingers curling into his shirt, desperately trying to keep up as Bokuto pours all his instinct and energy into kissing the hell out of Akaashi.

Akaashi pulls away, gasping for air. “Bokuto-san,” he whispers. “Are you… certain about this?” He’s not sure why he’s asking, feels like he’s just scrambling for purchase as Bokuto sweeps him away. He’s never liked the feeling of slipping, doesn’t like the lack of control, but now he _wants_ it and that’s even more terrifying.

Bokuto growls, mouthing at the neck that Akaashi has foolishly exposed to him. “Hey, ‘Kaashi,” he says, his startling eyes flickering up to meet Akaashi’s. “When you made all those faces when we were doing yoga, was that ‘cause I was touching you?”

“Yes,” Akaashi breathes, and Bokuto’s hands rove down to Akaashi’s thighs.

Bokuto pulls him up, lifting him easily, muscles flexing under Akaashi’s buzzing fingers as he deposits Akaashi on the bed, climbing on top of him. At this point, if Akaashi was in his right mind at all, he’d warn Bokuto to slow down, but Akaashi is too caught up in this, can’t act as Bokuto’s impulse control when he’s this intoxicated by Bokuto’s presence.

“Did you like it?” Bokuto breathes, running his fingers up and down Akaashi’s thighs, sending sparks up Akaashi’s side.

“Yes,” Akaashi says. He shouldn’t let this go any further. They should be taking their time. But Akaashi wants everything Bokuto wants to give him.

“And looking, too? At me?”

“Yes,” Akaashi says.

Bokuto grins and flips Akaashi onto his side with minimal effort, flopping down beside him and pulling him into his arms, squeezing him tight, his cheek soft against the back of Akaashi’s neck as he rubs up against it.

Akaashi blinks a few times while his brain readjusts to these new developments. _They’re spooning._ He realizes that he was entirely ready to get straight to something… less innocent, if Bokuto was ready for it. He groans.

“What?” Bokuto asks, sounding worried.

“Nothing,” Akaashi says.

“Come on, you can tell your boyfriend things,” Bokuto mumbles, presumably pouting into Akaashi’s hair.

Akaashi decides, just this once, to sacrifice his dignity to throw Bokuto a bone. “I thought we were going to have sex,” he mumbles.

Bokuto is quiet for a moment, then breaks out into laughter, shaking as he holds onto Akaashi tightly. Akaashi has never felt a blush so intensely. Bokuto lets out a desperate, hoot-like snort. “Akaaaaaashi, I can’t believe you’d think I’d just jump you without taking you on a date,” he gasps, still laughing. “But it’s really nice to think you’d just go along with it. I’m flattered, really.”

“Don’t ever speak of this again, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi mutters, hiding his face in his hands.

Bokuto kisses the back of his neck. “Okay, ‘Kaashi,” he says. “I won’t. And when we do have sex it’s gonna be really nice and romantic and my mom and Kuroo aren’t gonna be in the house.”

Somehow that only makes Akaashi more mortified. Bokuto squeezes him tight. “I’ve been a little stupid about this,” he says finally. _Oh, hell,_ he thinks. He’s going to have to give Bokuto another inch. “You make me a little stupid.”

Bokuto lets out an indistinguishable noise behind him. “AaGh _aa_ Ashiiiii…”

Akaashi sighs. He is, of course, very happy, but he has done quite enough of blurting those things out, and now it’s best if he tries to pull himself together, something that’s not going to happen if he allows Bokuto to get worked up. “We should probably go back downstairs,” he says. “I’m sure your mother and Kuroo-san are getting… ideas.”

“You mean like the ideas you got?” Bokuto chirps, and giggles when Akaashi elbows him in the stomach. Akaashi’s stomach flutters at the sound.

He untangles himself from Bokuto’s arms and pulls him out of bed. When they get downstairs, Bokuto’s mother is calmly tasting the pie filling with one hand and patting Kuroo on the head with the other as he groans into her shoulder. “Don’t worry dear, a sexual relationship is something that everyone comes into at their own pace.”

Akaashi sighs and pulls out his phone. **_I think your boyfriend is crying on my boyfriend’s mother’s shoulder because of your sex life._**

**_Oh my god why is he like this_** Kenma replies, then **_But congrats, guess being a moderately nice person did help your karma or whatever_**

**_Shut up._ **

**_Or maybe you were being stubborn and making life hell for yourself for no reason idk_ **

**_You’re a deeply unhelpful friend, Kenma._ **

**_I keep telling everyone but they wont leave me alone. Also come over if you wanna play that game we talked about_ **

**_Friday?_ **

**_Sure_ **

Akaashi looks up at Bokuto, who has joined in on comforting Kuroo, even though it seems that just Bokuto’s presence has gotten Kuroo back to his usual quippy self. Bokuto notices him looking and smiles, and Akaashi melts a little inside.

“Ah, Bokuto-san,” he says, smiling. “We haven’t actually done our yoga today.”

Bokuto grins. “Oh yeah.” He bounds over, his arm slung carelessly around Akaashi’s waist.

Akaashi glances back and sees Kuroo’s overjoyed grin and Bokuto’s mother’s challenging look (oh, she’s going to be putting Akaashi through hoops _forever,_ but Akaashi refuses to back down.) But best of all, Akaashi likes the look that Bokuto gives him, that slightly teasing but kind, deeply affectionate grin that would make Akaashi walk to the ends of the earth and back.

-X-

It takes them three weeks and five days before they manage to actually get any yoga done in their yoga sessions, because now every time Bokuto gropes him while positioning it, it’s an opportunity rather than a taunt, and Akaashi is intent on taking all of them, even if Bokuto nearly tears off his arm once because they fall over when Akaashi twists himself nearly in half to kiss Bokuto in the middle of a pose.

After all, Bokuto _clearly_ has a terrible effect on his brain.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment or come find me on [Tumblr](http://dgalerab.tumblr.com/)


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